Page:The Story of the House of Cassell (book).djvu/36

 readers accustomed themselves to "the habit of close thinking," and that if they could be induced to commit their thoughts to paper they might render good service not only to their fellow working men but also to other classes of the community. They responded wonderfully. He received over two hundred articles in the course of a few days, and promised a succession of monthly supplements filled with these things.

They won high praise from Cobden and the Earl of Carlisle, among other notabilities, who both wrote their congratulations to Cassell. The compliments were well-earned. The first three numbers contained work by three people who afterwards amply justified Cassell 's estimate of their capacity for "close thinking." One was "J. A. Langford, chairmaker, Birmingham," who became John Alfred Langford, LL.D., F.R.H.S., the author of "A Century of Birmingham Life." Another was "Robert Whelan Boyle, printer, Camden Town," who lived to be first editor of the Daily Chronicle. The third was "Janet Hamilton, shoemaker's wife, Langloan, Lanarkshire."

Her first literary work to see print was the letter sent to the Working Man's Friend. She had never been to school, and was theoretically quite uneducated; but she wrote many poems and essays which, in the words of Punch, entitled her to "a niche in the Temple of Fame." John Bright, who visited her in her Scottish home, declared that she was the most remarkable old lady he had ever met.

Probably nobody could read the Working Man's Friend nowadays. It was in the sombre, heavy style of the era of night schools and mechanics' institutes. But it played its part in assisting the self-education of the masses for two or three years before it gave way to better and brighter stuff from the same Press.

Already, in the early days of the Working Man's Friend, Cassell had begun to arouse public curiosity and to acquire popular fame. This was manifested on a great occasion in 1851—that of the triumphal progress of Louis